When fall rolls around, it’s all about the apples! The best apple cider I’ve had here in Maine is from Ricker Hill Orchard in Turner, ME. Luckily, we don’t have to travel to get it, it’s available at Bow St Market and Hannafords. Plus, just about every farmstand in the area.
I used to just buy a tiny bottle of cider, enjoy it, and call it a season. Now, as I’m trying to lay off the hot chocolate (sigh), and I don’t like tea or coffee, I find a cup of warm apple cider every morning is just the ticket. You can use a cinnamon stick to stir it, or just warm it up all on its own. This is the year I find out when cider is no longer in season. I hope it’s not for a few more months.
This apple cider bundt cake recipe was all over the interwebs a month or so ago. Everyone was sharing it, posting pix of it, and exclaiming how wonderful it is. Of course, I had to give it a go.
Excessive sweetness is not my idea of a good dessert, so I left a lot of sugar out of the original recipe, including a dipping sauce that was three cups of sugar too many for me.
There is plenty of room left for adapting this to meet your needs. Add nuts. Add a glaze instead of the cinnamon sugar. Make them mini muffin size if you want to send these off to family and friends. (I made sweet & spicy mixed nuts this year to include in the annual ‘foodie gifts from Maine’ I send to our kids. There wasn’t a mini-muffin’s space left in the box after I got done packing!)
Read the directions all the way through. Don’t be like my friend Julie who added all the cinnamon into the cake at once! (BTW–she said it was really good with all the cinnamon in the cake. You decide for yourself.)
| Prep Time | 15 minutes |
| Cook Time | 35-45 minutes |
| Passive Time | 20 minutes |
| Servings |
slices
|
- 1 box yellow cake mix (not the pudding kind)
- 1 cup apple cider (not apple juice)
- 1/2 cup apple sauce (natural, not heavily sugared)
- 3 eggs (large)
- 1 tsp cinnamon (add more if you like)
- 1 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 tbsp cinnamon
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup butter
Ingredients
Cake
Topping
|
|
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Mix all cake ingredients (cake mix, apple cider, apple sauce, eggs, 1 tsp cinnamon, brown sugar, and vanilla) in a large bowl.
- Pour mix into a greased, floured bundt pan. (I used a 10" bundt pan, about 12 cups in size.)
- Put on a baking sheet on the center rack of the oven. Bake for approximately 35 minutes. Test for doneness. Bake longer if needed. (My version was in for 40 minutes and it looks a little overdone to me. See photo.)
- Remove from oven when done, turn out to cool.
- Mix cinnamon and sugar together. Put in a shaker. You will have some left over to use on toast tomorrow morning!
- Melt butter in microwave (20 seconds to start). You want the butter creamy, not clear. Brush melted butter on cooled cake, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.
When we cut this into servings, we cut along the bundt pan lines which gave us 8 wide slices and 8 narrow slices. You can cut it however you want!
If you opt for apple cider mini muffins, bake for 14 minutes. Cool and brush with butter. Dip in cinnamon sugar.
Want to try more of our recipes? Head over to the bed and breakfast recipe page. Would you rather someone else cooked for you? Check out our availability!